I have the VS 2010 Windows Phone Express, but it does not contain features I need. Does anything can screw up if I install Ultimate over that version of Visual Studio?
No. Both products should work fine side-by-side.
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Currently I am using visual studio 2010 in a new Windows 8 machine and I am a Windows Phone developer. Windows Phone SDK works properly only in VS1012 on Windows 8.
In case of Windows Phone, what's the difference between using visual studio express or add-in on visual studio 2012 ultimate?
Visual Studio Ultimate is a powerful professional and commercial tool. It offers you to install extensions, testing capabilities and all sorts of cool stuff that you may or may not need or even not know they exist. To compare editions in details, go here.
If you just wish to develop apps for Windows Phone 8, Visual Studio 2012 Express for Windows Phone will be fine - complete SDK is available to you, and in that sense it shouldn't be any different. You get the emulator(s), Blend etc. However, you will have to switch to other Express versions if you wish to develop for other platforms, too.
From an SDK feature perspective, there is no difference. If you already have VS2012 Ultimate, then you should use it with the add-in because of all of the extra capabilities that VS2012 Ultimate has over VS2012 Express. But if you don't have Ultimate already, it's worth noting that VS2012 Express is free and Ultimate is rather pricey - so if all you want to do is develop WP apps/games, Express is probably sufficient for your needs.
I just installed VS 2010 Professional Edition, then the Service Pack 1. So now I wanted to install the 7.1 RC for WP7. The first thing it tries to do is download VS 2010 Express. Is this normal? Do I really have to install 2 versions of VS to develop for WP7?
If you already have a valid and applicable edition of Visual Studio 2010 installed, then the installer installs the SDK, Expression Blend, emulator, etc. and adds the necessary project templates into your existing edition. It will not install Visual Studio 2010 Express if you have already have an existing edition, so there are no issues around multiple installs of Visual Studio.
Is Windows Phone 7 Development SDK available for other versions of Visual Studio 2010 than Express?
If I already have the Ultimate version do I still need to download VS2010 Express to use WP7 SDK?
When you install the Windows Phone 7 SDK it installs everything including "Visual Studio 2010 Express for Windows Phone" even if you have another non-express version of Visual Studio 2010 already installed.
If you have another version of VS2010 installed. the installer will NOT create any shortcuts for the express version. Nor will it set any file associations for it.
This has two effects:
The installer is simpler (It just gets everything and only needs logic around setting shortcuts) and so should be less buggy. - Most people have no issues with it. The few who do have problems have mostly fixed them with a repair of the install.
You can use both the Express and other version of VS2010 on the same machine. I find this particularly useful when looking at open source or demo projects which were created with the express version.
The WP7 environment will install into your existing instance of Visual Studio if you have one (and will install an Express edition if you don't)
Yes, you would need to download the full SDK. But nothing to worry since installing the SDK would automatically take care of installing the templates, and you should be able to work with your Ultimate edition with all the goodness :)
Microsoft could verify that the Visual Studio (not Express) is already installed on the machine BEFORE you download the Express version!
Still, the Express version does not interfere with your other version of Visual Studio.
I just discovered that our MSDN licensing covers Premium, and I installed Professional.
Can I just install Premium over Professional, or do I have to uninstall and reinstall everything? I'd rather not if installing on top of Professional is safe since I have addins and configuration already set up.
I came across the some issue and needed to upgrade from Visual Studio 2010 Professional to Visual Studio 2010 Premium.
I simply installed Visual Studio 2010 Premium over the Visual Studio 2010 Professional version. All worked without issue ;0)
I did need to reinstall my VS add-ins and service packs (such as Silverlight 4 Tools) and point to my original settings file but that was all. Looks like most or all of my extensions remained in place.
Just did this, but used the web installer instead of the full iso. Works like a charm. Didn't have to reinstall anything. Resharper, Silverlight and Azure templates, etc.. are working.
The only difference is that you need to insert the product key to activate it, like it says on the MSDN downloads site: "This key converts web installers and trial DVDs to the full product. It is not required for the MSDN DVD."
Hope this helps
I just pulled the 2010 ultimate from MSDN, and I see there's no "Smart Device" options anymore. Does anybody knows how to enable it, or how to install it?
Sincerely,
Yvan
According to various sources in the net Visual Studio 2010 doesn't support Windows Mobile 6.5 development (see here and here for example). Of course there might be an SDK available in the future. For now, you need to use Visual Studio 2008.
Now you can with windows phone SDK7.1 You just need Visual Studio 2010 SP1 and download the Windows Phone SDK 7.1 from here